Bleistein v. Donaldson Lithographing Company, 188 U.S. 239 (1903), is a case in which the United States Supreme Court found that advertisements were protected by copyright.

Holmes described the posters as being "of an ordinary ballet", of "the Stirk family, performing on bicycles", and of "men and women whitened to represent statues".Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., writing for the Court, found that it was irrelevant that the posters were made for advertising.

Holmes laid out this ruling in language which has become well-worn in copyright case law:[1] It would be a dangerous undertaking for persons trained only to the law to constitute themselves final judges of the worth of pictorial illustrations, outside of the narrowest and most obvious limits.

Yet if they command the interest of any public, they have a commercial value -- it would be bold to say that they have not an aesthetic and educational value -- and the taste of any public is not to be treated with contempt.A dissenting opinion was submitted by Justice Harlan, joined by Justice McKenna, agreeing with the Sixth Circuit that advertising posters "would not be promotive of the useful arts within the meaning of the constitutional provision", and were therefore not "fine art" for the Constitution permitted protection.

Diane Leenheer Zimmerman, "The Story of Bleistein v. Donaldson Lithographing Company: Originality as a Vehicle for Copyright Inclusivity", in Jane C. Ginsburg and Rochelle Cooper Dreyfuss, Intellectual Property Stories (2005), pp.